Sanctions against Iran will hit Samsung phone users

Samsung will cut off access to app store on May 22.

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Samsung has informed its mobile phone users in Iran that it will no longer be providing access to the company’s app store as of May 22, 2013. The move comes as a result of the ever-increasing sanctions that Western countries are imposing as a punishment for Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program; Tehran has continuously denied the existence of such a program.

We contacted Samsung for comment but did not receive an immediate response.

Iranians have felt the pressure of sanctions even more this week as Tehran has raised the rial’s official price to the dollar, making imports far more expensive—Bloomberg reported that meat prices have shot up 60 percent, while cooking oil has jumped 35 percent. (The unofficial black-market exchange rate is even higher still.)

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Cyrus Farivar
Cyrus is a Senior Tech Policy Reporter at Ars Technica, and is also a radio producer and author. His latest book, Habeas Data, about the legal cases over the last 50 years that have had an outsized impact on surveillance and privacy law in America, is out now from Melville House. He is based in Oakland, California. Emailcyrus.farivar@arstechnica.com//Twitter@cfarivar

Iranians have felt the pressure of sanctions even more this week as Tehran has raised the rial’s official price to the dollar, making imports far more expensive—Bloomberg reported that meat prices have shot up 60 percent, while cooking oil has jumped 35 percent. (The unofficial black-market exchange rate is even higher still.)

"You call those 'Sanctions'? We'll show you sanctions. We'll make it even harder to buy your stuff!"

With sanctions as strong as they are, how can Samsung still sell its phones to Iranian customers?(I have heard of tech products being purchased outside and then brought into Iran, but the this sounds like Samsung is selling its products directly into Iran.)

Is Angry Birds now "dual use" or something? Couldn't they just block the uranium enrichment apps?Since this obviously has nothing whatsoever to do with weapons, I can only conclude that Samsung are just being dicks to ordinary people in Iran just for the hell of it. What a bunch of vindictive arseholes the fine folks at Samsung must be.

Limiting outside media and apps, through embargo, in a country that is already repressing its people is stupid. This is such a brain dead idea that it could have only been conceived in a government bureaucracy.

Since this obviously has nothing whatsoever to do with weapons, I can only conclude that Samsung are just being dicks to ordinary people in Iran just for the hell of it.

Samsung doesn't have a choice. Under the US sanctions programme, it isn't allowed to do business with Iran. That includes accepting payments on an app store. If Samsung does accept payments from Iranian residents, it will face its own sanctions from the US Government.

I'm sure Samsung didn't just realise this. It was almost certainly issued with a warning.

These sort of sanctions aren't at all targeted. They affect every Iranian resident, including those in the Green Movement who want reform and opening up of the government. In many ways they are counterproductive as a result, because many of the middle-class, educated organisers of the protest movement have emigrated over the past few years, for economic reasons as much as political, and there isn't anyone to replace them. The whole economy is collapsing, meaning the only jobs worth having are government jobs, and they require at least some pretence of loyalty and piety.

However, none of that is Samsung's concern. They just have to obey the sanctions, just like every other company.

Wow talk about cutting your nose off to spite your face, i am sure that there will be plenty of people that can hack all the apps so that Iranians can get them on to their phones free, i don't see that being much of a problem. Sadly it just makes Samsung look bad and Iranians will probably boycott them and turn to something else.Remember that most phones come from China and China i am sure has no interest in losing business for some crazy sanction.In fact this could be good for the rest of the world, helping to fund the next big mobile manufacturer to come out of Asia..

Sorry i have to add another post as i thought of another point.I lived in South Africa when the sanctions there were at there highest and i must say that sanctions actually helped the country tremendously. Being put in a position where you have to develop your own tech encourages more testing of things that others have stopped funding, It may take them time but Iran could weather the sanctions rather well, as most citizens of a country will do almost anything to support their government against other countries financial attacks.As long as Iran has their underground contracts with Americans and European businesses i am sure they will do just fine.

Sorry i have to add another post as i thought of another point.I lived in South Africa when the sanctions there were at there highest and i must say that sanctions actually helped the country tremendously. Being put in a position where you have to develop your own tech encourages more testing of things that others have stopped funding,

Strange, so did I, and I remember the 1989 elelctions where the Nats desperately tried to explain how they would resurrect an economy that was collapsing. Sanctions played a huge role in forcing them to the table and efforts like Sasol were little more than a bandaid. They do, however, assume that the ruling class is willing to act rationally.

Sanctions designed to punish the population of a country by driving up the cost of goods are a form of economic warfare. We can laugh and feel chummy about denying Iranians an App store but the real consequences of a jump in the price of food and everyday basic items is only going to hurt the general population and lead to increased hunger, malnutrition and child mortality. It doesn't matter what you think of the current Iranian government, these sanctions do nothing to limit their ability to rule.

Maybe Samsung could give the Iranian public a free PGP app of sorts, just in case Iran becomes a repressive country run by a theocracy. It would be a revolutionary gift (hint hint).

Encryption won't help when the Iranian version of internet censorship is just to slow the internet to a crawl, or disable it altogether.

Whenever there are protests, internet speeds slow down to dial-up modem rates for weeks, with periods of total outages.

Also, Iran is a bit more blatant about their spying. A trend recently is to accost suspected dissidents at the airport, hold them, search for their name on Facebook, then if they find an account, to make them log in so they can see their recent activity. If there's anything even slightly anti-regime, you're in deep water. If you don't log in, you're in deep water. If it turns out it's someone else's account with a similar name, you're still in deep water for not logging in.

If they can find a webmail account in your name, they will make you do the same thing.

So, most Iranian friends of mine create separate webmail accounts for any correspondence with government departments, make sure their "personal" webmail uses a nickname rather than their real name, don't use their real name on Facebook, and disable their Facebook account altogether when visiting family back home.

Lots of people criticising Samsung when the reason for this is a US sanction. There's a reason Apple and Microsoft are not turning off their app stores in a similar move - because their phones are not allowed to be sold there in the first place by those same sanctions.

Can we please stop referring to 'western countries' or 'western civilization'. This is a horribly anachronistic term. Case in point we're talking about a Korean company responding to sanctions adopted by countries that pretty much circle the globe.

Can we please stop referring to 'western countries' or 'western civilization'. This is a horribly anachronistic term. Case in point we're talking about a Korean company responding to sanctions adopted by countries that pretty much circle the globe.

When they said "western," did you know the qualities and characteristics they were referring to? The type of government and situation in the country referrered to?

Sure, it's no longer as accurate a term as it was a few decades ago, but the fact remains that everyone that speaks englisch knows what is meant when they hear "western countries," "western influence," etc. If anything, the mere fact that it's no longer as accurate reinforces its original meaning to the "non-western countries": the influence of the west spreading east and "infecting" others.

Your complaint is almost akin (hyperbole warning) to the bit in Clerks 2 about "i'm taking [porch monkey] back," in that you're complaining about something with well-understood meaning (the very purpose of language in the first place: to convey meaning) and don't like that there could be something better that just isn't used. Sure there could be, but it doesn't change over night, and the phrase holds meaning that is well-understood, so it sees continued use.